


My Brother, Myself

by SegaBarrett



Category: Better Call Saul (TV)
Genre: Backstory, Childhood, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 11:47:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13294203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SegaBarrett/pseuds/SegaBarrett
Summary: A few moments in which Chuck and Jimmy were together and apart.





	My Brother, Myself

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JenniferNapier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenniferNapier/gifts).



> Disclaimer: I do not own Better Call Saul, and I make no money from this.
> 
> A/N: Title is a variation on the book "My Mother, Myself" by Nancy Friday.

Charles McGill was sitting in a chair in the living room, hunched over a desk and looking at a page in a book, lit only by a tiny lantern.

“Chuck… What are you doing?” Jimmy asked, looking up from the couch.

“Studying… Jimmy, ask me in an hour. I need to get a good grade on this test… It is going to determine the rest of my life.”

Jimmy turned to take in his brother from head to toe. Chuck always looked so distinguished, so together, as if nothing had ever been out of his reach. He was twenty-two and ready to take on the world. He had decided he wanted to be a lawyer when he was eleven or twelve, and he had never looked back for a second.

Chuck had always been Jimmy’s hero. He had drawn pictures of Chuck when he was little, and Chuck had always stood three Jimmies high.

Now, Jimmy was fourteen and had just started high school. They had called it “the big school” when they had been little kids. Now, Jimmy found himself wondering why they had all seemed so tall before. It felt like a letdown now that he was one of them. 

Would he ever grow to be someone like Chuck? Someone… big? Someone who understood the world?

“What kind of a test is it?” Jimmy had tried to stay quiet but it was hard; it was always hard to filter things from what he wanted to do to what he should do; Chuck always told him that he needed to be better about that.

Chuck sighed.

“It’s called the LSAT. It’ll decide whether I get into law school or not.”

“Is it hard to get into law school?”

Chuck chuckled.

“It is extremely hard to get into law school, and even harder to stay there.”

“Then why do you want to do it?”

“Because that’s the only point to doing anything at all, Jimmy!” Chuck exclaimed with frustration. “That’s the trouble with you, sometimes. You like to do things that are easy. Things that are fun. The point is to do things to prove that no one else can do them – to show that you’re indispensable.”

Jimmy considered the words for a while. He did like those things that came easy to him – making friends, playing on his skateboard, convincing people to go along with his plans. Was that wrong? When he found things that weren’t easy – trigonometry, for instance – he usually preferred to put it off, to place it to the side or to convince one of the smart kids to do the work for him. He had a nice network of nerds because he had figured out how to supply each of them with what they wanted; usually, money did the trick but there were a few holdouts for, for instance, marshmallow truffles.

“Are you indispensable?” Jimmy asked. It seemed clear that Chuck would have to be – everyone in the McGill family relied on Chuck for everything. 

He laughed bitterly. 

“No. But I will be one day.”

***

The first time Jimmy realized that there was a life without Chuck in it was about a week after Chuck had moved to Albuquerque.

“Why would he want to move there?” Jimmy had said to Marco, laughing as he tipped back a beer and the other man smoked from a bong. “Cicero’s where it’s at. He could do anything he wanted here. Chuck could write his ticket.” 

He didn’t like the desperation underneath the words. He didn’t need Chuck; he’d do just fine without a big brother looking over his shoulder. It would be much better, in fact – now, Jimmy could do the things he wanted to do without feeling as if there was the tap, tap, tapping of Chuck’s wings in his ear reminding him that he could be better.

Not that it would be that easy – just because Chuck himself wasn’t there didn’t mean that his scent wasn’t still slathered over as many of Jimmy’s thoughts as he could possibly touch, didn’t mean that it was possible for Jimmy to stop talking to himself in Chuck’s voice as he weighed out every decision and, ultimately, opted for the wrong one.

“He doesn’t know how good we have it,” Marco told him, “He never did.” He looked over at Jimmy with the same sort of starry-eyed hope he always did, the same look that frustrated Jimmy. Had that been the way he looked at Chuck? If so, no wonder he had run off to Albuquerque, a place Jimmy couldn’t have found on the map a few months ago.

“It’s cold, though,” Jimmy offered eventually, “Maybe he was ready to come in out of the cold.” He paused. “Isn’t that what they say when spies come back? Maybe Chuck actually works for the CIA.”

“He would be way too boring to work for them,” Marco said, “Though I read that a lot of what they do is just look at like, taxes and stuff.”

“Taxes?”

“Yeah, man, like look at who doesn’t pay their taxes and then they find out if those people are using the money they saved to like, try and take over the country and shit.”

“That’s wild, man. We should try and work that into something… Do you think someone would believe we were CIA?”  
Marco chuckled.

“Not me. I’m too fat.”

“You could be my handler.”

Marco laughed.

“And have a name like… Chambers or something?”

“Well, McGill would fit then.”

Jimmy ordered another drink, and he laughed at Chuck. His chest hurt.

***

“I want an ice cream cone, Chuck.”

“What the hell are you doing, Jimmy? It’s six in the morning!”

“I want an ice cream cone.”

Chuck reached over and turned on the tiny lamp by his bed to stare at his brother. He had stayed up late reading Les Miserables – frustrated that the high school library only carried the abridged version. Why did he have to suffer simply because his town was full of idiots and plebeians?

And then there was Jimmy, the perfect little bundle of joy his parents had brought home four years ago and hadn’t stopped doting on ever since. 

The worst part of all of it was that Chuck felt protective over the little brat. Every time Jimmy demanded something, Chuck found himself running. He had asked his parents for a cat – not a dog, because dogs chewed up everything and couldn’t go more than a few minutes without attention – and hadn’t gotten one, but he had received a puppy in the end. One that walked on two feet, no less.

And now he was demanding ice cream as the sun came up. Where the hell was Chuck meant to get such a thing? It wasn’t as if the ice cream trucks were riding around this early – not that Chuck would know – or the parlors would be open. Maybe there was something in the fridge he could give him.

Chuck climbed down off of the top bunk – Jimmy was always whining that he wanted it, and their parents kept telling Jimmy that he might crack his head open from up there – and snuck down to the kitchen. 

It was freezing when he opened the door to the pantry. He wished he had pulled on a sweatshirt or something – or anything. Jimmy was standing in the kitchen with his hands in his pockets, waiting.

He was always waiting.

Ten minutes later, they were sitting on the floor of the kitchen, two frozen metal forks stuck in two bowls of chocolate ice cream. Chuck had his eyes closed as he felt his mind freeze over.

That was a shame. He was going to need it later in the day. Why did he always do this stuff for that little brat?

***

Jimmy never told anyone. He figured they would think it was silly, and Chuck would most of all. It was like he never got emotional about anything, let anything upset him, or even let anything make him happy.

He left that to Jimmy. 

He’d sit on the roof and watch Chuck drive away in his car, realizing that soon he would be in college. Sure, he wasn’t going far – just into the city, the University of Chicago. 

But soon he wouldn’t see him much anymore; soon he’d be busy with college things and he wouldn’t have any time for Jimmy. 

He’d actually managed to hand in his essay on time that day; Chuck would be proud if he told him.

But he wouldn’t tell him, because it was so silly and ridiculous and dumb.

Jimmy would never tell anybody.

***

But when he got his essay back with a big “A” written across the front, he left it on the dining room table. The way he was always leaving things around the house.

Jimmy, that was him, Chuck mused, finishing tying his tie and getting ready to climb in the car for the first day of classes. He’d have to leave soon if he wanted to beat traffic.

He didn’t have time to be picking up after Jimmy on this of all days. 

He sighed and scooped up the essay, at first stunned into stopping by the fact that Jimmy got an A on something.

And then he read:  
 _My hero is my brother, Chuck. Nothing ever stops him. He’s the smartest person I know._

Chuck walked upstairs and opened Jimmy’s door, opened a drawer and tossed it in.

“Good luck, Jimmy,” he mumbled, pulling his car keys from his pocket. He’d need it, after all.


End file.
